Disabled persons in Poland

It is generally considered that disability is an important social problem. This was expressed for example by the decision of the United Nations Organisation to nominate 1981 as the International Year of the Disabled. The number of disabled is one of the main problems. For social planning, the proper allocation of goods and resources for changes in the attitudes of society towards disability it is necessary to identify the prevalence, distribution and composition of the disabled. Prior to the 1978 Census, in Poland there was no information available on disability except the number of disabled persons legally classified by the Medical Board for Disability and Employment receiving disability pension, as well as the average amount of such pension, the number of disability certificates issued annually, the number of employed and the number employed in co-operatives for the disabled. The social criterion--major social role associated with psycho-physical state--was the main concept of the investigation on the frequency of disability in 1978 Census. Methodology used in this study of disability was based on the U.S. experience gained from the 1970 NC, as well as on the NCHS Survey of psychophysical causes of permanent limitation of social role performance and locomotion, performed since 1957. It should be explained, however, that the scope of disability investigated in NCHS Survey and in Polish Census is exactly the same and much wider than in U.S. Censuses. The Polish National Census revealed that there are 2,485,001 disabled persons in Poland, i.e. 7.1% of the total population. The urban population constituted 57.7% and the inhabitants of rural areas 42.5% of the total population. The majority of the disabled came from urban areas--62.2% compared to 37.8%. The rate of disabled persons in the population aged 50 or over was 73%, while in the whole population it was 23.9%. Observations made during preliminary comparisons of work disability in males in U.S.A. and in Poland indicate that differences in prevalance rates were not so significant: U.S.A.--11.8% and Poland--8.9%. And these differences referred mainly to disabled persons in the 25-44 age group whose rate is larger in U.S.A. On the other hand, differences in behavioural response to functional impairment of the disabled in U.S.A. and Poland are quite significant, at least, among the employed. The level of employment in the general population was almost identical whilst among the disabled it was almost twice as low in Poland. It seems that prevalence of disability, conditioned biomedically and treated as an index of health status, is very similar in U.S.A. and in Poland. But some behavioural responses of the disabled differ considerably and relate to features of the social system.